Acai Travel has secured new funding, revolutionising travel operations with AI. Their platform addresses post-COVID challenges in operational inefficiency and staffing shortages, while enhancing agent efficiency and customer interactions.
The Spanish tech startup revolutionising travel operations with AI, today announced the closing of a $4 million Seed funding round led by Nauta, with support from DraperB1 and One Travel Ventures. This funding will accelerate Acai Travel’s mission to tackle operational inefficiencies and staffing shortages facing travel companies and agents in the post-COVID landscape, building a scalable, efficient, and responsive system that meets the demands of today’s travel industry.
Leveraging industry expertise to revolutionise travel operations with ai-powered efficiency
The platform, used by leading travel companies like Kiwi.com, lastminute.com, World Travel Inc., and Goway, significantly boosts agent efficiency, optimises call centres, and streamlines customer interactions. Founders Riccardo Vittoria and Henry Chen Weinstein, with their extensive backgrounds in AI and the travel industry, previously collaborated on 30SecondsToFly. After its acquisition by AMEX Global Travel, they founded Acai Travel in 2023, which has offices in New York and Barcelona, to drive operational transformation in the travel sector. Their combined expertise, gained from collaborating with top companies like Boeing and Lufthansa, is central to Acai Travel’s innovative approach.
AI addresses pressing post-COVID challenges in travel operations
The travel industry has faced significant disruptions since COVID-19, with a surge in demand coinciding with agent shortages and heightened operational complexity. Today, travel agents manage an increased volume of customer inquiries and navigate more complex inventory distribution systems that emerged as companies pivoted to new technologies. Acai Travel’s AI-powered solutions offer a unique approach to addressing these challenges by reducing inefficiency, solving staffing challenges, and meeting increasing customer expectations.
Travel operations remain largely manual, with agents relying on outdated tools and repetitive workflows. Acai’s solutions, such as GDS Overlay and AI Helpers, improve efficiency by automating repetitive tasks, translating complex fare rules into everyday language, and simplifying information retrieval for agents, which reduces the average handling time for inquiries by 20% on initial accounts.
“In under four months, we’ve reduced average handling time by 20% for one of our TMC customers on a single account. As we roll out our full suite of products, including enabling non-GDS trained agents to manage complex requests, we can achieve a 70% cost reduction. It’s time to bring travel operations into the 21st century. AI is the key to making that happen,” says Weinstein.
The COVID-19 pandemic led to mass attrition in travel staff, leaving the industry in need of flexible, skilled workers. Acai’s platform enables companies to leverage agents in low-cost countries, optimising service delivery through AI Translation and Intelligent Routing, even when agents lack formal GDS training.
Additionally, Acai’s Intelligent Routing matches travellers with agents best suited to their needs, while AI Helpers allow agents to resolve complex issues quickly. These features collectively help companies provide a superior customer experience, fostering brand loyalty and ensuring a seamless travel journey.
Strategic priorities for the new funding
With the new funds, Acai Travel will support growth by driving several key initiatives. These include the continued development of its core platform to incorporate additional automation, thereby improving efficiency and service quality for agents. These solutions aim to streamline complex workflows, reduce training time, and enhance customer interactions by revolutionising travel operations with AI. Additionally, Acai Travel plans to expand its services across Europe and North America to meet the rising demand for reliable and flexible travel solutions. To further support this expansion, the company will focus on talent acquisition, building a skilled team in travel operations, digital product development, and customer service to optimise platform effectiveness and support its rapidly growing client base.
“Acai is using AI to modernise travel operations with fast and easy-to-use tools so agents can focus on what they do best-delivering exceptional travel experiences. It’s an exciting milestone to raise a Seed round from experienced investors who understand the industry challenge and are backing us to solve it,” noted Vittoria.
Empowering travel companies with data-driven insights
Acai Travel’s platform also provides travel companies with deep insights into customer behaviour and preferences, identifying service improvement areas to enhance customer satisfaction. This data-driven approach allows companies to anticipate traveller needs, reduce costs, and fine-tune their offerings, providing a competitive edge in a rapidly evolving market.
Commenting on the investment, Jordi Viñas, General Partner at Nauta, said, “Covid-19 restrictions caused a huge drop in demand for travel and subsequently led to many trained agents leaving the sector. As demand returned to pre-pandemic levels, companies have struggled with efficiency and profitability. But Acai Travel’s platform, making use of LLM technologies and deep sector expertise, transforms travel operations by enabling companies to reduce handling times, hire untrained agents and build a cheaper, more flexible workforce. We’ve been really impressed by the founding team’s industry experience and are really excited to see the impact they have on the travel industry over the long term.”
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